From Hot Flashes to Frozen Shoulders: What Nobody Warned Us About
Turns out, our bodies keep score... and a running list of surprises!
It’s October, aka Menopause Awareness Month - and that’s as good a reason as any to stop treating menopause like the quiet ending to a romantic comedy. In reality? It’s the sequel no one asked for - full of plot twists, side effects, and absolutely no instruction manual.
In my own personal Menopause Trilogy - now in Wave Three, the latest “guest star” is something I call Slushy Shoulder. Imagine frozen shoulder’s slightly less committed cousin - still uninvited, still overstaying its welcome. Some of my friends got the full freeze. Me? I got the slow-thaw version. Because apparently, one round of menopause surprises just isn’t enough.
My Menopause Starter Pack (Spoiler: It Started at 37)
For anyone new here (and sorry to those who’ve heard this one before; consider it a rerun worth watching):
37: Symptoms began - tiny (but looking back pretty damn clear) clues that something was shifting.
40: Baby No. 3 arrived. Hormones performing Cirque du Soleil routines.
47: Periods stopped - just when I thought the ride was over.
50+: Surprise - joint pain, brain fog, sleep sabotage, and that “why did I come in here again?” blankness never asked for my permission to start… or to make an encore appearance.
But here’s my recent gut punch: I had no clue how many symptoms trace back to low hormones… some lists cite more than 100 of them. And several are tied to serious long-term risks like cognitive decline and heart disease. That black hole of information? It damn near broke me.
Joint Pain: The ‘WTF, Now Menopause’ Guest That Won’t Leave
Six months ago, my Slushy Shoulder strutted in… not fully frozen, half-stiff, half-fine, and endlessly annoying. It started as a dull ache I blamed on bad pillows, sleeping funny, and years of bad posture, but she’s stuck around long enough to earn a name. (Yeah, I call her Slushy.) Menopause really knows how to keep the cast interesting.
Turns out, estrogen isn’t just about night sweats - it quietly keeps our joints lubricated and inflammation under control. When it drops, things creak and ache in places you didn’t know could complain. For a while, I thought I was just getting clumsy. Nope. Just another delightful surprise from the menopause (and POST menopause) toolkit.
Here’s What Science Wants Us to Know (And So Do I)
Back in July, I wrote about the FDA’s long-overdue panel discussion on removing the black box warning from vaginal estrogen cream - and their broader conversation about menopause symptoms.
That post includes a Q&A with Cris Amato - NP, plus a link to the full panel discussion replay (and trust me, it’s two hours well spent).
And now, as of October 2, 2025, it’s official: the FDA plans to make changes to that ridiculous black box warning on many hormone replacement products. Commissioner Dr. Martin Makary confirmed it. Translation? Women’s health is finally - finally - getting the attention it deserves.
What hit me hardest, though? How little I actually knew. We spend decades wrangling periods - plus pregnancies or fertility struggles for many of us, and navigating the hormonal hurricanes that blow through our days on repeat. Yet when it comes to menopause, the single biggest health transition of our adult lives, so many of us (myself included) are wildly undereducated.
And yes, there are voices out there - Halle Berry talking openly about perimenopause, Naomi Watts building an entire brand around it, Dr. Kelly Casperson debunking all the medical nonsense, and even Oprah weighing in from the celebrity perch - but most of us are still piecing it all together on our own.
Case in point: when my period stopped, no one ran baseline hormone labs. Not my doctor, not me asking for them. Years later, as new symptoms hit, only then did I realize there were tests I should have had all along.
So here’s the deal: you can’t fix what you don’t measure. Ask for the labs - early and often. Estrogen, progesterone, thyroid, cortisol. Dr. Mary Claire Haver even has a free checklist you can bring to your next appointment!
These symptoms aren’t random; they’re road signs. It’s time we treated them that way.
Sidebar: Not Menopause… But Still Worth Your Ear
Hearing Loss & Dementia! This one hits close to home. I’ve been in full-blown hearing-aid denial for two years. My nurse daughter and her wife keep reminding me of the research: mild hearing loss doubles dementia risk, moderate triples it, and severe loss quintuples it. So yep… I’m finally ordering the damn things.
A Journal of the American Medical Association Neurology study found that people in their 60s who used hearing aids had a 61% lower risk of dementia than those who didn’t. Why? When your brain has to work overtime just to process sound, it drains the mental bandwidth you need for everything else - like memory, focus, and handling life’s curveballs.
And because we’re not gatekeeping the critical shit here: Midlife isn’t just about juggling work, relationships, and hot flashes. It’s also about protecting your cognitive health before decline sneaks in.
What Does Help? Real-Life Hacks That Don’t Suck
Lift something heavy - even canned soup works. Muscle is metabolism’s best friend.
Eat protein, real food, and yes - tacos. Carbs aren’t the enemy; deprivation and extremes are.
Sleep like it’s your second job. No amount of kale offsets exhaustion.
Move. Every day. Weight-bearing activities protect joints, bones, and mood.
Supplements? Think bone–supportive vitamins (D, calcium) and anti–inflammatory fat (hello, salmon) but always talk with your doctor first! Even Dr. Jen Gunter reminded us in a recent New York Times piece (behind a paywall, of course, but she shared it here on IG) that supplements require caution, not blind faith.
Why I’m Writing This
Because we don’t need to suffer quietly in the Slushy Shoulder Club. This era is not a silent decline - it’s a call to get louder, stronger, realer. I mean, look around: Halle Berry, Michelle Obama, Naomi Watts, Drew Barrymore… they’ve dragged menopause out of the shadows and into the spotlight, where it belongs.
This blog - and the whole Real Girls Guide - is my shout across the room: you’re not crazy, and you’re not alone. We’re done pretending to be “fine” and smoothing over the truth. We’re saying it, laughing through it, and standing taller because of it.
Got menopause symptoms no one warned you about? Drop them in the comments! Your story might be the one that helps another woman feel seen.
Because the Real Girls Guide to Over 55 isn’t just a blog or a book. It’s a conversation, a movement, a crew… and you belong in it!!
We’ve earned every wrinkle. Might as well make more laugh lines together.
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No hot flashes but joint pain, hip pain so bad I was stuck sitting on the toilet. Plantar faciatis, itchy ears, brain fog that made me question my cognitive abilities, the list goes on…All ignored by my doctor because those aren’t “typical” menopause symptoms. It’s so affirming to know that we’re not alone. We must continue to be advocates for ourselves.
Hmm just thought of this… I wonder if fibromyalgia gets misdiagnosed when it’s actually menopause and then women get terrified that they have a disease which exacerbates everything hmm…